I have to say that being Canadian, I’m pretty into hockey. My Vancouver Canucks have me sitting on the edge of my seat, cheering for the better part of each year. The Canucks just made it through the first round of playoffs (of course!) and are now heading into the 2nd round to face the Chicago Blackhawks….the team that knocked us out of the playoffs last year! Nothing like sweet revenge….! Anyways, I decided to show some Canucks spirit in the best possible way I could, by making cupcakes….which I like to call “Canuckcakes”! What burly hockey player wouldn’t love getting caught eating a pretty cupcake

These cupcakes are vegan (both vanilla and chocolate) but I chose to make a standby icing recipe from cooking school- Italian buttercream…which is pretty much the opposite of vegan. I was super impressed with the cupcake recipes, which came from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World, though I did modify them a bit. I also made vegan sugar cookies to decorate the mini cupcakes with. These are definitely an ‘occasional indulgence’ on the health scale, but playoff fever is sweeping Vancouver and the only cure is more Canuckcakes.

I love all the Canucks, but I hold a special place in my heart for #3…Kevin Bieksa. So of course I made a cupcake sporting his number…and then I daydreamed about what it would be like to hand deliver the cupcake to him….and then I got so excited I smudged his name. Oops!

I have a confession: I think I just drooled.

I have a 2nd confession: I don’t think it was because of the cupcakes.

All “joking” aside, these were fun to make and I’m sure friends and family will enjoy them as we take on Chicago in round two, beginning this weekend! I should mention that the design on the cupcakes is the Canucks vintage logo.